Arsenal: David Ospina a pointless reserve

David Ospina has revealed that he is likely to return to Arsenal after his loan spell with Napoli. The Colombian shot-stopper, however, is a pointless reserve. There is little reason to keep him around.

The point of a reserve player is to provide depth. Injuries, suspensions and natural rotations to preserve the sharpness of players are inevitable during a long and arduous season and it is sensible for clubs to make plans to deal with those eventualities. That is what having a squad is for.

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At the goalkeeper position, it really only requires two starting-calibre options and then a third developmental option. In Bernd Leno, Arsenal have their starter. And he will be their starter for at least next season barring a dramatic dip in performance. Petr Cech is the experienced, dependable, veteran reserve.

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But next season, Cech will be gone, retiring in the summer. The reserve position is up for grabs. And there is a name to throw into the mix of possible candidates. David Ospina will be back in the fold. Speaking this week to Radio Blu, the Colombian admitted that it is unlikely that he will remain at Napoli beyond the end of the season:

"“My current situation is that I am on loan for this season and there’s a clause based on the number of games, so if I play regularly, it’ll become an automatic purchase. When the situation doesn’t depend on me, all I can do is wait for the decisions to be made by Napoli. The club had just spent a lot of money on Meret, a young goalkeeper with a great future ahead of him, so I knew that when he came back from injury, this might happen.”"

This begs the question, then: Should Arsenal consider Ospina as a reserve goalkeeper next season? The answer, in my mind, is an unequivocal ‘no’.

Here’s why. Ideally, you want your reserve goalkeeper to have the following characteristics: dependable and improving. Oftentimes, it is only possible to get a goalkeeper that has one of those characteristics — see Cech and dependable. But ideally, you want both. If both is not possible, however, then you can usually find a goalkeeper that has one.

Ospina isn’t either of those things. He is 30 and is unlikely to improve any further, having proven an inability to iron out the stupid mistakes that have riddled his career, and he is extremely inconsistent, because of the mistakes, and unreliable, meaning that defenders cannot trust him when he plays in net.

As such, Ospina becomes a bit of a pointless reserve goalkeeper. It would be much better to have Emiliano Martinez and Matt Macey, who will also return from loan spells, as the second and third-choice options, or go out and sign a veteran, trustworthy option who has experience of the Premier League, like Chelsea did with Asmir Begovic, for instance.

Ospina’s return should only lead to one thing: his exit. He does not fit the profile of a reserve goalkeeper whatsoever. It makes no sense to keep him.